Page 103 of A Subtle Scar
Tiamat’s magic lapped at Ronny’s wounds, mended and closed. I could tell her magic was slowed, though it was not as hampered as my own had been.
“You two, listen,” Tiamat said. “That right there is an artifact made by the first gods, the Old Ones. They are rare and hidden, most of them supposedly in the otherrealms.
“This one has slept here and has woken to give its power to these people, but ultimately, it has been taking. There is not time to explain, but what you need to know is that once these coins have gathered enough power, they become like a wildfire, and you cannot extinguish such a fire. All you can do is create a firebreak.
“This one is nearly pure chaotic magic. I will take it into me. That should stop it burning.”
I nodded. I was watching Ronny’s guts move back into his body under Tiamat’s hands.
“And you?” Chandler asked.
“I’ll be the firebreak,” the Dragon Mother said.
My mouth fell open, and my heart dropped.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
“Andyou?”Iasked,but I knew the answer.
I’d taken one step toward that disc in the floor, my feet moving on their own accord. The people stayed back, dazed, weapons dropping from their fingers. The disc was doing something to them, definitely influencing them, maybe changing them.
“I’ll be the firebreak,” the Dragon Mother said.
I knew I wasn’t having a trance, but either way, I had never seen a situation as clearly in my life as I saw this one.
I, Vincent Chandler, was here today for one single reason.
Charon and Hermes, Metatron, Lucifer, and even Lionel now, they were a family. The other gods they cared about, who had celebrated the Equinox and Lionel’s birthday with them, they were a family too.
I was pretty sure I had met them so I’d understand that about them. They were family like me and Victor had been, and the Dragon Mother watched over all of them.
I was sure as shit not going to let her sacrifice herself. She was going to take her time healing Charon, and he would fly again. He and Hermes would have each other, and they would be happy, two gods bickering and fucking for all the rest of eternity.
And I was here to make it so. I was here, one half of a circle, about to complete its circumference, and when it was done, I would be with my brother, wherever it was a person’s essence went. They’d dig a hole next to Victor’s plot and put my body there, and mom would no longer have to dread me walking through the door for a holiday, the grown ghost of the dead son haunting her.
All of it was so fucking clear, so easy. A perfect equation that I couldn’t argue with.
And in the center of it all, that glowing copper disc, it called to me. I saw and felt it, watched as the three people with the deer skulls on sagged forward, their eyes gone metallic, their limbs the graying paleness of corpse flesh. The disc, it shifted its attention to me now.
But, fuck, the maybe.Maybe I could have loved them. Maybe I could have borne their love. Maybe I could have learned to accept it and not run from it.What a fucking near-death revelation, but such was my luck.
I’ll be the firebreak, the Dragon Mother had said, perfectly distracting Hermes. That was my opening, right there.
I made a run for the disc. The people with the skull masks were still chanting although their voices sounded like echoes. Their bodies sagged, life and movement sucked out of them.
I grinned. The last triumph of my life was that I hadn’t hesitated for a second to get to the fucking glowing coin thingy, but no one even saw that I was ending life in awesomeness and without hesitation. It was okay though. I was okay with that.
I touched my hands to the disc. I didn’t know what to do, but the moment palm touched metal, instinct took over, and I drew on my psychometry, my touch magic. Never before in my life had that type of magic come this easy to me.
And then, I let go.
Psychometry. Me, it had always given visions. Just images, nothing moving, but clearer than whatever weird thing the trances had tried to convey.
I saw a playing card on a field of black. No, not just black. A sky, dusted with stars. There, right there on the left, the seven Perseids gleamed.
The playing card was golden, the etchings on it showing a boy in the fetal position, arms around his legs, head tucked against his knees.
If this is death, it’s fucking weird,I thought, and the boy lifted his head.
